A Star Is Born and Cold War both explore tragic tales of artists and their love

Two very different films released this year – A Star Is Born and Cold War – explore very similar themes of two artists trying to protect their love from the emotional maelstrom created by their egos, insecurities, ambitions and ennui.

(left) Joanna Kulig and Tomasz Kot in Cold War, dir. by Pawel Pawlikowski
(right) Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper in A Star Is Born, dir. by Bradley Cooper

A Star is Born is riding a wave of critical acclaim and audience love. It has a very good chance to earn Oscar nominations for actors Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper, as well as for Mr. Cooper as a director. If so, he would join the likes of Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson and Kevin Costner who have made the leap from acting super-stardom to distinction in directing. There are many levels on which A Star Is Born excels, considering it’s the fourth time this story has been filmed (1937, 1954 and 1976 previously). Bradley Cooper had to bring something new to the table; he contemporized the setting, but he also created a viewing experience that brings the viewer into the personal space of the protagonists, compared to its predecessors. The first hour in particular, is pure movie magic, taking the audience through Jackson Maine’s post-concert, alcohol-fueled runabout to his (and the audience’s) discovery of Ally’s raw talent singing La Vie en rose at a drag bar, followed by their tentative exploration of a shared love of music while sitting in a car park – I would have been happy if the entire movie had just continued that car park scene. Maine takes Ally under his wing and as her star rises and she creates her own artistic identity, he spirals into depression, anger self-doubt and finally, self-loathing. They try to reconnect, but can their love for each other overcome the external and internal forces that are pulling them apart? Perhaps the bigger question is, how much of their love is genuinely for the other person and how much of it is for the idea of who that other person is?

These are the same questions that crop up while watching the Polish film Cold War. Unlike A Star Is Born, this film is directed by an experienced director Pawel Pawlikowski, who has been winning awards for his work for the past two decades, including Best Director at Cannes for this film. Likewise, lead actors Joanna Kulig and Tomasz Kot have been around for several years and have won recognition for their acting previously. Kot plays Wiktor, a music director working for the Communist regime, traveling through the Polish countryside in 1949 with his colleagues, looking to recruit raw talent for a folk music and dance show. Among the hundreds of performers they audition is Zula (Joanna Kulig) and you can see that Wiktor is immediately taken up with the young girl, her casual insouciance, her voice and her looks. They start a passionate affair, its turbulence and unpredictability in contrast with the upward trajectory of their professional careers. Unlike A Star Is Born which tracks the relationship of Jackson and Ally in real time in the early part of the movie as well as in other key moments, Cold War follows Zula and Wiktor’s relationship in episodic snapshots over a 15 year period in episodic snapshots. Like billiard balls, they keep crashing into each other every few years, unable to live together and unable to live apart. Unlike the lovers of A Star Is Born, there are no obvious issues of jealousy or ego pulling Zula and Wiktor apart; just personal caprice, impulsive and reckless acts, artistic restlessness and ennui. Which makes their story seem even more tragic.

A Star Is Born is an emotionally traumatic viewing experience, which is an amazing achievement by a first-time director and a first-time actress. Cold War, in the hands of a more experienced director and actors, tells its story using a colder, emotionally distant aesthetic, appropriately shot in crisp black & white. With A Star Is Born, it’s the moments and the emotions – in the car park, singing Shallow for the first time, that disastrous Grammy awards night, Jack begging for forgiveness on his return from rehab – that stay in the viewers memory. With Cold War, it’s the shot composition and visual storytelling – Wiktor and Zula talking in the field, Zula singing while floating in the river, Wiktor in front of a mirror reflecting his troupe celebrating their first show, Wiktor and Zula at the dance club and finally the shot of them looking out onto a barren field – that haunt the viewer.

Wiktor and colleagues look on their troupe with pride after their first successful show

Wiktor and Zula in the early days
Zula becomes a star

Constantly drawn together…
…and torn apart

At the end of Cold War, only a bleak future awaits

Both films are well worth watching. A Star Is Born is more accessible and is for the most part, an intensely absorbing viewing experience in spite of its 2 hour 14 minute running time. In contrast, at a brisk 89 minutes, Cold War does not tax the viewer’s patience, but is made for the head rather than for the heart.

Aquaman: Spectacular world-building and a perfectly cast hero overcome clunky dialogue and wooden acting

The Aquaman comic book character that I grew up with (70’s comics and 60’s cartoon shows) looked and behaved quite differently from the version that evolved in the 90’s. He went from being a clean-cut do-gooder to a rather wild, edgy and unpredictable hero, with the arrogance of his royal lineage but with compassion born out of his time being raised among common surface dwellers. In the 2010s, he’s gone back to his clean cut look, but retained the edginess.

Aquaman through the years (left to right): 1) Clean-cut look of the 1960’s and 70’s.
2) sporting long hair and beard from 1994; soon after, he lost his hand and it was replaced by a harpoon hook.
3) the current “clean and mean” look of the 2010’s.

Warner Bros. made a good call to go with the 1990’s wild look and found the perfect casting in charismatic 39-year-old Hawaiian actor Jason Momoa, who is surely getting a ton of hits on his Instagram page this month as Aquaman opens to big box-office numbers in theatres around the world.

The cast is rounded out with a host of big names/great actors (not necessarily the same thing) like Nicole Kidman (playing Aquaman’s mother Atlanna), Temuera Morrison (as his human father, Thomas Curry), Patrick Wilson (as King Orm, Aquaman’s half brother), Amber Heard (as princess Mera), Dolph Lundgren (as her father, King Nereus), Willem Dafoe (king’s advisor Vulko) and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (as mercenary/pirate Black Manta).

I will repeat what every other reviewer has said about the movie – the world building is pretty spectacular. We have become used to seeing alien worlds in sci-fi films and take for granted that with CGI, there is no limit to what can be rendered on screen in a live action film. I guess the novelty here is that the ‘alien’ world of Atlantis is situated in the deep oceans of our own planet. It is depicted in incredible detail…ancient ruins, modern high-tech cities, fantastical underwater creatures and the post-human evolutions of Atlanteans, including the Fishermen and the dreaded Trench! I had to constantly pan my eyes from one corner of the screen to the other to absorb all the detail. Watching it on a giant IMAX screen is the only way to see it! There are several action set-pieces and all of these are immensely entertaining, including the early submarine sequence, the chase in Sicily and the jaw-dropping final battle.

The only exception to the whole look and feel were the women’s costumes. Both Amber Heard and Nicole Kidman looked rather uncomfortable and ridiculous in their form fitting outfits; Jason Momoa on the other hand looked just fine, as he finally emerged in his signature gold and green outfit towards the end of the movie.

The problems begin when the action stops. That’s when people have to talk to each other and it starts feeling a bit like the Star Wars prequels directed by George Lucas in the 90’s; Oscar-nominated actors look ill-at-ease delivering their lines and even we in the audience are just waiting for them to stop talking and do something else! Case-in-point were the scenes involving Jason Momoa and Amber Heard, as I could see no chemistry between them whatsoever (in sharp contrast to say, Gal Gadot and Chris Pine in Wonder Woman or Henry Cavill and Amy Adams in Man of Steel and Superman v Batman). There were exceptions though – when Aquaman shares a drink with his father in a bar, or when Vulko is training young Arthur Curry to become Aquaman, there seems to be genuine warmth between the characters.

It’s a pity we no longer live in the era of memorable movie scores; I think lazy music directors find it too easy to splice in some pop or rock song into a key movie scene and this is the same thing with Aquaman as well. Songs like Pitbull’s Ocean to Ocean (which inexplicably samples Toto’s Africa, just because the scene is set in the Sahara desert) or Roy Orbison’s lovely She’s a Mystery to Me, just seem to stick out like a sore thumb.

Irrespective of these specific complaints, the overall movie is entertaining, mainly on the strength of Jason Momoa’s screen presence, the action sequences and of course, the incredible underwater world of Atlantis. In spite of mixed reviews from critics, Aquaman has already raked in big money since opening in China a couple of weeks ago and is expected to open big in North America this weekend. Warner Bros. must be relieved that their standalone superhero movies (Wonder Woman being the other one) are seeing better traction than their ensemble films like Suicide Squad and Justice League. Surely the way forward is to continue exploring the individual stories (and also ensuring that Zack Synder doesn’t direct any of them!). At the same time, I can well imagine Warner Bros. considering an on-going TV series that further explores the worlds, cultures and peoples of Atlantis, perhaps with just the supporting characters, just as Marvel has done with S.H.I.E.L.D. or Disney is about to do next year with The Mandalorian series set in the Star Wars universe.